Petraeus Gets McCain’s Back

John McCain has been one of the most visible backers of the Iraq troop "surge," and of General David Petraeus’ efforts to deploy those new soldiers. So it makes sense that Petraeus, the American commander in Iraq, would get the Senator’s back, after his controversial, heavily-armed stroll through a Baghdad market, meant to show just how well the "surge" was going. Here’s Petraeus, on PBS’ News Hourlast night:

JIM LEHRER: Senator McCain was… talking about how he was able to walk around on the streets of Baghdad, particularly in a market. But today Iraqi tradesmen in Baghdad called that whole thing a propaganda move. What can you tell us about that? Was it just simply a propaganda move, a photo-op?

GEN.
DAVID PETRAEUS: No, I mean, he spent an hour in the market. I was actually with him. He was in a baseball cap. He did wear body armor, because we advised that he ought to do that. Certainly, there was security around him. I mean, nobody ever wants to lose, you know, senior senator or the multinational force Iraq commander in their area of operations.

But having said that, there were tens of thousands of Iraqis in that market. It’s the largest or second-largest market in
Baghdad. It is one of those that has been hardened by the placement of concrete barriers literally all around it.

And it may be as much as a kilometer, almost a mile long, so this is an enormous market, as I said, tens of thousands of Iraqis in it. He was not protected by a cocoon of security. Yep, there was security there, but he was out — actually he helped the Iraqi economy quite a bit, bought a number of carpets, in fact. And he haggled with the merchants himself, with an interpreter, and was moving all around very freely…

I
mean, a suicide vest bomber could have walked up to him just as easily as they could have walked up to me. We were not, you know, surrounding him, again, with some kind of cocoon of soldiers. He moved around freely.

We have helicopters usually flying when I’m actually out in the markets, as well, I mean, sometimes whether you know it or not, because, as I mentioned, no one wants to lose, you know, some high-ranking guy on their watch.

Again, having said that, there are snipers that are always possible. There are others who are possible in these marketplaces. You cannot control that kind of activity. And, again, I thought, you know, it was a fairly routine stop out there, in terms of just sort of strolling through a market, albeit with, you know, squads of guys out there in that marketplace.

As regular readers know, I’ve got a ton of respect for Petraeus. But I think he’s off-base — or, at least, ignoring some pretty important context — here. McCain’s market trip wasn’t just some routine VIP visit. It came on the heels of the Senator’s assertions that there were neighborhoods he could walk around Baghdad "unarmed."